Donora, Pennsylvania: the most magical place in baseball

It’s difficult to believe this is a real thing. We’ll have our staff statistician research the probability of the following, but you can bet it’s infinitesimally slim: Two elite MLB players, Stan Musial and Ken Griffey, Jr., were both born in the same small Pennsylvania town.

Donora, Pennsylvania, is home to fewer than 5,000 human beings. The chances of two Hall of Fame ballplayers being born there is small, but even more bizarre: Stan the Man and The Kid were born on the same day: November 21 (albeit 49 years apart). Ken Griffey Jr. is the second best left-handed outfielder from Donora might be the strangest true thing you’ll read all day.

Musial was a 20-time-All-Star and seven-time batting champion. He batted .331 and belted 475 home runs in his career. And he was good of a man off the diamond as he was on it, Musial was awarded the Preside,ntial Medal of Freedom in 2011, the country’s highest civilian honor.

Stan Musial having a laugh with JFK during at 1962 All-Star game.(source/Twitter)

Ty Cobb, who was, for his part, as bad of a man off the field as he was good on it, said this about Stan Musial.

“No man has ever been a perfect ballplayer. Stan Musial, however, is the closest to being perfect in the game today…. He plays as hard when his club is away out in front of a game as he does when they’re just a run or two behind.”

Ty Cobb

Ken Griffey, Jr. was one of the most impressive power hitters and sweetest swingers of his era. The Pennsylvania native hit 630 home runs in a career compromised by injury. Both he and Musial are on the list of the best hitters in baseball history – are they in the right spots:

TSM Biofrost

Source: Riot Games Flickr

Mickey Mantle

I LOVE Mickey Mantle. No, I wasn't alive for him during his playing years, but I don't care, he ruled. Here are some of his career achievements: AL Batting Champion in 1956 where he also hit for the Triple Crown, 4x AL Home Run leader, 20x All Star, 7x World Series Champion, and most impressive of them all, spokesperson for Natural Light. What a life he lived. (Source: Twitter)

Barry Bonds

Did Barry Bonds take steroids? Yeah, probably, but do I care? No, no I do not. You don't hit 762 career home runs, as well as 73 home runs in a season on just steroids alone, you have to have some skill to do so, and my god did Bonds have the ability to hit the hell out of a baseball. He was just a good hitter, that his home run record may not even be the most impressive thing on his resume. His 2,558 career walks, and 688 career intentional walks, both MLB records, just proved how feared he was by pitchers. And like Pete Rose, it is a damn shame he's not in the Hall of Fame. (Source: Twitter)

Echo Fox Header

Source: Riot Games Flickr

Tony Gwynn

The late great Tony Gwynn was a flat out monster from the plate. Has all the great hitting achievements by batting for over .300 in his career, to go along with his 3,141 hits, but he also had 8 NL BATTING TITLES TO HIS NAME. That is absolutely outrageous. He would have had a World Series title too, but my 1998 Yankees (best team ever) had something to say about that. (Source: Twitter)

TSM Biofrost

Source: Riot Games Flickr

TSM Doubelift

Source: Riot Games Flickr

Babe Ruth

Babe Ruth is the true American dream. Being a total fat slob, but also being an out of this world professional athlete who's the greatest of his time. I don't care if he was playing against a bunch of chumps, Babe Ruth would crush baseballs to the freakin' moon, while being the most out of shape guy on the field. God I love that guy. (Source: Twitter)

CLG Aphroo

Source: Riot Games Flickr

Fabian “Febiven” Diepstraten

The ex-Fnatic man who was at one point considered amongst the best mids in the world, not just Europe. Even though his performances have been okay, its not as good as it could be, leaving people to doubt whether he still is the number 1 mid in EU as he is so often described to be.

Unfortunately, Donora’s claim to fame seems to be about all the rust belt town has going for it. Larry Stone, profiling the Western Pennsylvania locale for the Seattle Times, began his piece with a string of some of the most depressing sentences ever written about a place.

“The peeling sign greets drivers as they cross the Monongahela River on the “Stan The Man” Musial Bridge ‘Donora, The Home of Champions.’”

Yeesh. And it gets worse once Stone talks to the Donorans.

“Donora is a decaying town, another in a long line of once-flourishing Rust Belt boroughs along the river in Western Pennsylvania that have hit hard times. The steel mills closed long ago. A broken-down bridge that was Donora’s last business life line was imploded last year. Inhabitants wonder if their city is ever going to get its luster back.”

“‘It’s really depressing, and basically, everybody moves out of this town,” said Dennis Lomax, 64, who grew up in Donora and moved back about 10 years ago to be near his daughter and two grandchildren.”

Phew. That’s a dim portrait. Sad to see a place that was such an improbable vortex of baseball greatness fading into oblivion. But whatever happens to Donora, at least it produced Musial and Griffey.